God's double decree of predestination !

[sojourner]

Jude writes of men who were of old, ordained to condemnation ! Jude 1:4

4For there are certain men crept in unawares, who were before of old ordained to this condemnation, ungodly men, turning the grace of our God into lasciviousness, and denying the only Lord God, and our Lord Jesus Christ.

Of old here means from eternity !

As men are Chosen from the beginning to Salvation 2 Thess 2:13, so as early men were Chosen from the beginning for condemnation.

Let me ask you a question:
If God loves us (Jn. 3:16), and God is omniscent, why would a God who loves us create some of us to suffer eternally? It doesn't seem either plausible or logical to create something one loves in order for it to suffer eternally.

I think there's something vastly wrong with your thinking.

 

[sojourner]

So also the unsaved [ the reprobated] are rejected solely due to the purpose of God's good pleasure, and not because of anything they have done or not done.

So... God rejects some of God's beloved children due to God's "good pleasure?" I don't buy that.

Why should it be unjust for God to not show mercy to some of mankind and punish them for their sins !

Because God is love, and love demands forbearance. Even earthly parents, who don't always know how to do good to their children, don't punish them for ever.

I think you need a crash course in Biblical theology and Greek philosophy. Something's getting FUBAR in your translation.

 

[anthony55]

soj:

Because God is love, and love demands forbearance.

Tell that to the Angels that sinned and God showed no mercy and no forbearance ! God was still Love, but just not to them. So God being Love does not solve the issue. 2 Pet : 24

For if God spared not the angels that sinned, but cast them down to hell, and delivered them into chains of darkness, to be reserved unto judgment;

The God I serve and witness for you cannot demand anything from..

 

[anthony55]

Let me ask you a question:
If God loves us (Jn. 3:16), and God is omniscent, why would a God who loves us create some of us to suffer eternally? It doesn't seem either plausible or logical to create something one loves in order for it to suffer eternally.

I think there's something vastly wrong with your thinking.

John 3:16 does not ensure that God Loved all men without exception, it states that God so loved the world. We must know what world means biblically and not what you think it means. Those God does not Love, He hates and created them as vessels of wrath. Yes God hates invidulals Rom 9:13

As it is written, Jacob have I loved, but Esau have I hated.

 

[sojourner]

Tell that to the Angels that sinned and God showed no mercy and no forbearance !

First of all, the angels are not of the world. We are. Second, In what context is the passage to be taken? Literalistically? Firguratively?

God was still Love, but just not to them.

Was God still God? Then God was still love. I opine that the passage does not weigh as heavily in the salvation myth as other passages.

The God I serve and witness for you cannot demand anything from..

This sentence doesn't make sense.

John 3:16 does not ensure that God Loved all men without exception, it states that God so loved the world.

A picayune distinction of wording that needs to be painfully stretched in order to fit your point. I think we all know what the passage means.

Those God does not Love, He hates and created them as vessels of wrath. Yes God hates invidulals

...and who was Romans written to? Believers! It's real easy to make the distinction of who God loves and God hates when those whom "God loves" are doing the writing and the reading. I just don't think we can take these passages as universally applicable.

 

[Mister Emu]

What do you make of 2 Peter 3:9 which explicitly states that God wills all men to come to repentance?

 

[sojourner]

What do you make of 2 Peter 3:9 which explicitly states that God wills all men to come to repentance?

Conveniently "forgotten?"

 

[anthony55]

soj

First of all, the angels are not of the world

Doesnt matter if God is Love. Angels are His creatures.

 

[ellenjanuary]

God's double decree of Predestination, that from all eternity, not based upon anything of His creatures, neither good nor evil, God did detemine that some of His creatures should have everlasting life, and that some should have everlasting damnation on account of their sins.

I disagree. I blame Paul. I assume he was the prophet of the NT; and being a prophet comes with a sense of temporal dislocation. Scope these requirements: one must be human (subject to causality) but have a mind that processes simultaneity. And questioning god when one is a prophet, one has the difficulty of being god - that's what it is to get a "sliver of the eternal" from the source in the form of Holy Spirit. Which means the self-analyzing prophet always gets contradictory answers about eternity. So, Paul, in his agenda, covers all the bases. Today, we have science. There is no future, there would be no point, for it is the job of the past to create the future. What people seem to have trouble realizing is the difference between forever, which is a made-up assumption, and eternity, which is a very real thing... but it is timeless, not the some of all time.

 

[anthony55]

ellen:

I disagree. I blame Paul.

Ok you have a right to that opinion.

 

[ninerbuff]

John 3:16 does not ensure that God Loved all men without exception, it states that God so loved the world. We must know what world means biblically and not what you think it means. Those God does not Love, He hates and created them as vessels of wrath. Yes God hates invidulals Rom 9:13

As it is written, Jacob have I loved, but Esau have I hated.

Yep got to love a "perfect" god that hates.

 

[RomCat]

God's knowledge of the future in no way
pre-determines the free choices you will make.

 

[anthony55]

God's knowledge of the future in no way
pre-determines the free choices you will make.

What scripture says that ?

 

[Terrywoodenpic]

I blame Calvin for putting these silly ideas in peoples heads.

 

[sojourner]

I blame Calvin for putting these silly ideas in peoples heads.

Predestination works great, because it assures the believer of her/his disposition in God's kingdom. But it does nothing for the disenfranchised. Who are precisely the people Jesus came to save.